MANGO

Learn more about this magnificent fruit mango. Their properties, nutritional values, medicinal uses are discussed here.

Botanical Name: Magnifera indica, Linn

Family Name: Anacardiaceae

Description:

This is the most popular and the choicest fruit and occupies a prominent place among the fruits of the world. Very few other tropical fruits have the historic reputation like that of mango.
It grows on a large evergreen tree 10- 14 m high with a heavy dome-shaped crown and a straight stout bole.

NUTRITIVE VALUE

This fruit is one of the highly prized fruit of the tropics. It has rich aromatic flavor and is decent in taste having well blended mixture of acidity and sweetness. Unripe fruits are usually acidic and used for culinary preparations. Ripe fruits are preserved by canning or used in the manufacture of juice, squash, jams and jellies, preserves.

Analysis of the flesh of green and ripe fruits gave the following composition (per 100 gm):

Contents in green fruit:

Moisture: 90 %

Protein: 0.7 %

Fat: 0.1 %

Carbohydrate: 8.8 %

Minerals: 0.4 %

Calcium: 0.01 %

Phosphorus: 0.02 %

Iron: 4.5 mg per 100 gm

B-Carotene: 1.50 I.U.

Vitamin B1: 2 mg per 100 gm

Vitamin B2: 30 micro gm

Vitamin C: 3 mg per 100 gm

Niacin: 2 mg per 100 gm

Contents in ripe fruit:

Moisture: 86.1 %

Protein: 0.6 %

Fat: 0.1 %

Carbohydrate: 11.8 %

Minerals: 0.3 %

Calcium: 0.01 %

Phosphorus: 0.02 %

Iron: 3.0 mg per 100 gm

B-Carotene: 4,800 I.U.

Vitamin B1: 8 mg per 100 gm

Vitamin B2: 50 micro gm

Vitamin C: 13 mg per 100 gm

Niacin: 13 mg per 100 gm

Nicotinic acid: 13 mg per 100 gm

Fiber: 1.1 %

The mango fruit also contains –

Fluorine, iodine, copper, potassium, sulfur, magnesium

The sugar and acid contents may vary as per the condition and variety of the fruit. Sucrose, glucose and fructose are the principal carbohydrates present in the ripe fruit; maltose is also present.

Small amounts of cellulose, hemicelluloses and pectin are also present. The green tender fruit is rich in starch; during ripening the starch is hydrolyzed into reducing sugars and a part of the latter is synthesized into sucrose. In the post-ripening stage, sucrose decomposes into reducing sugars.

Unripe fully developed green fruits contain citric, malic, oxalic, succinic acids besides two di-basic and tri-basic acids; citric acid is the dominant constituent. As the fruit ripens, acid content decreases to more than the half.

MEDICINAL USES

1. Ripe mango fruit is considered invigorating, refreshing and fattening. The juice along with aromatics is recommended as a restorative tonic.

2. It is a powerful nutritive fruit, containing most of the essential substances needed by our body.

3. It contains vitamins and minerals along with important chemicals that can keep our body fit and fine. So, it is a complete natural food.

4. Eat six pieces of unripe fruit at a time per day for a week, clears all stones from kidney. This should be repeated consecutively 3 years in mango season.

5. A drink made from boiled unripe fruit with salt and sugar is a wonderful remedy for heat stroke.

6. Take powdered fruit seed 3 times a day to cure diarrhea and dysentery.

7. Mango juice and milk is a restorative tonic. It should be taken throughout the season to stay healthy.

8. Toothpowder prepared from the leaves keeps teeth healthy.

9. The gum obtained from the tree is used for dressing cracked feet and scabies. It is also considered anti-syphilitic.

10. Sun-dried slices of the unripe fruit are excellent remedy for scurvy.

11. The resinous liquid, oozing out at the cut end of the stalk of a fruit about to ripen, mixed with lime juice is a useful dressing for scabies and other skin diseases.

12. Eat the skin of the unripe fruit with sugar for menstrual disturbances. The skin is astringent and a stimulant tonic. Its powder is given with the milk and honey for bleeding dysentery and as a tonic for the digestive organs.

13. The ripe fruit is laxative, diuretic and useful in hemorrhage of uterus, lungs and intestines.

14. The Sind of the fruit is astringent, stimulant and used as a tonic in debility.